Hey, Why Isn't This (API) Free

10 Nov 2014

It always makes me happy to see a pricing page, front and center when I visit an API, but I found an added bonus over at the email API, Inbox. At the bottom of their pricing page, they have a pretty simple question: Hey, why isn't this free?

It’s become painfully clear in the past few years that if you’re not paying for something, you’re the product. In practice, this has resulted in “free” platforms that eventually were forced to show ads, sell user data, or fire-sale to a large company to only be unloved or shut-down.

We’re taking a different approach. The Inbox API isn’t free. You pay us, and we run the service. That’s it.

We know our pricing might still be prohibitive to some apps getting started. If you’re a startup building on the Inbox Platform, please get in touch by emailing [email protected]

I like their style. I just don't understand the smoke & mirrors when it comes to pricing in the API space, and fully support API providers who offer no B.S. pricing for their API resources.

It is little things like this that keep me trolling through the developer areas, and back alleys of the API space each day.